Autonomous Pan-Amazonian and Mesoamerican Archaeological Survey: Identifying Regional-Scale Urban Sprawls and Hydraulic Networks Through Open-Access LiDAR and AI Pipeline

For over a century, archaeological orthodoxy maintained that tropical rainforest environments across the Amazon Basin and Central American lowlands were incapable of sustaining complex, high-density urban civilizations due to soil nutrient limitations and dense rainforest canopies. Leveraging open-access airborne LiDAR repositories alongside our newly developed **Archae-Hunter AI** spatial co-occurrence framework, we present an exhaustive, multi-regional survey spanning four major unexcavated biomes:1. Campeche/Tabasco Lowlands (Mexico - Maya Pyramids & Sacbe Highways)2. Llanos de Mojos (Beni, Bolivia - Casarabe Monumental Mounds & Canals)3. Acre Geoglyph Corridor (Brazil/Peru Frontier - Geometric Ditches)4. Upper Caquetá River Terraces (Colombia - Fluvial Bluff Settlements) Across these four biomes, our automated pipeline systematically identified **30 high-confidence monumental urban complexes**, interconnected causeway arteries, and seasonal canal embankments. The algorithm was benchmarked against the UNESCO World Heritage site of Calakmul, achieving a 98.4% precision rate. This repository contains the full preprint manuscript, complete GeoJSON spatial vector layers (30 sites with coordinates and confidence metrics), multi-directional hillshade rasters, and cross-sectional elevation profiles under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license for open field verification.

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Publication Details

Journal
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
Published
2026-10-27
DOI
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23680395
Primary Topic
Archaeological Research and Protection
Type
preprint
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preprint

Autonomous Pan-Amazonian and Mesoamerican Archaeological Survey: Identifying Regional-Scale Urban Sprawls and Hydraulic Networks Through Open-Access LiDAR and AI Pipeline

Tetsuo Ohizumi
1 links
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
Archaeological Research and Protection
preprint

Autonomous Pan-Amazonian and Mesoamerican Archaeological Survey: Identifying Regional-Scale Urban Sprawls and Hydraulic Networks Through Open-Access LiDAR and AI Pipeline

Tetsuo Ohizumi
preprint en

Abstract

For over a century, archaeological orthodoxy maintained that tropical rainforest environments across the Amazon Basin and Central American lowlands were incapable of sustaining complex, high-density urban civilizations due to soil nutrient limitations and dense rainforest canopies. Leveraging open-access airborne LiDAR repositories alongside our newly developed **Archae-Hunter AI** spatial co-occurrence framework, we present an exhaustive, multi-regional survey spanning four major unexcavated biomes:1. Campeche/Tabasco Lowlands (Mexico - Maya Pyramids & Sacbe Highways)2. Llanos de Mojos (Beni, Bolivia - Casarabe Monumental Mounds & Canals)3. Acre Geoglyph Corridor (Brazil/Peru Frontier - Geometric Ditches)4. Upper Caquetá River Terraces (Colombia - Fluvial Bluff Settlements) Across these four biomes, our automated pipeline systematically identified **30 high-confidence monumental urban complexes**, interconnected causeway arteries, and seasonal canal embankments. The algorithm was benchmarked against the UNESCO World Heritage site of Calakmul, achieving a 98.4% precision rate. This repository contains the full preprint manuscript, complete GeoJSON spatial vector layers (30 sites with coordinates and confidence metrics), multi-directional hillshade rasters, and cross-sectional elevation profiles under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license for open field verification.

Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
Sustainable cities and communities, Industry, innovation and infrastructure
Archaeological Research and Protection
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Autonomous Pan-Amazonian and Mesoamerican Archaeological Survey: Identifying Regional-Scale Urban Sprawls and Hydraulic Networks Through Open-Access LiDAR and AI Pipeline — Tetsuo Ohizumi · Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) (2026) | TGRS Research Map | TGRS